


I Know

by moonwillow27458



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Apologies, Gen, Post-Possession, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Season/Series 14, Trauma, Uncomfortable Dean Winchester, Uncomfortable Sam Winchester, Unresolved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-10
Updated: 2020-12-10
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:41:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27999153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonwillow27458/pseuds/moonwillow27458
Summary: After being possessed by Michael, Dean finally understands the trauma Sam faced after being possessed. They have a difficult conversation about their trauma.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 30





	I Know

**Author's Note:**

> this fic takes a dean critical stance on what happened with the gadreel situation, but this is a scene that i think needed to happen, with dean finally understanding why what he did was wrong

“You okay?” Sam asked. 

It had been the third night in a row he’d found Dean in the kitchen at 4am sipping black coffee. Sam was used to not sleeping, pulling all nighters to research or getting up early to run when no one could watch him. But Dean. Dean like his sleep. Had never been a morning person; not when they were kids, or when they were on the road, or when they were fighting the apocalypse. So yeah, it was worrying Sam to see Dean fending off sleep.

“Yeah,” Dean said but his voice was rough and his eyes were red. Sam pulled a face. “No.”

“What’s up, man?”

“I keep… feeling him,” Dean said. “Michael. I keep waking up wondering, is he still in here?”

Dean’s hands were shaking around his coffee mug. Caffeine and trauma were a bad mix. Sam pulled the mug away before it shattered. It didn’t even register with Dean, who was staring at the cracked tile on the opposite wall.

“I just wanna stop having nightmares about it, man. Being inside your own body and not being able to move, it’s horrible.”

“I know,” Sam said. And he didn’t look up, didn’t need to to know Dean was looking at him. This was the first time Dean ever truly knew what it was like. And Sam didn’t need to rub it in his face.

“I’m sorry,” Dean said.

“I know.”

There was a moment of silence, because there wasn’t really anything either could say to comfort the other. Shit sucked. And it sucked a whole lot worse for a Winchester. Dean tried to take a sip from the coffee mug that was no longer there. Sam felt sorry enough to give it back.

“Do the nightmares go away?”

And Sam thought back to the reason why he was awake. That he had been asleep all of twenty minutes before the memory of Kevin’s burnt out eyes had reached him. Clawed the inside of his school. Burned onto his eyelids in a permanent cinema. How he woke up at 4am to run from the nightmares, and how they always caught up with him in the end. How Sam had been running on empty since Meg took his body all those years ago.

“Mine haven’t,” Sam said. And maybe Dean’s would, maybe it was different for him.

“I’m sorry, Sam,” he says again. And he was breathing heavy. “About Gadreel. I thought it was for the best but, Christ. It’s awful, it’s-”

He was just barely crying. And Sam wanted to say it was okay. But it wasn’t. It never was and Dean couldn’t take back he’d done and all Sam could do was forgive him. Hope know that Dean knew, he would never do it again.

“I know,” Sam said. It was all he could say.

**Author's Note:**

> i know this isn't a resolved ending, but i think it's realistic. i don't think that sam should necessarily forgive dean for what happened, but at least now they cna empathise with each other
> 
> i hope you enjoyed reading
> 
> this was a request i got over on my tumblr [benevolentsam](https://benevolentsam.tumblr.com) feel free to drop me a request in my inbox


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